Obama: Critics of court nominee twisting her words

By Caren Bohan

WASHINGTON, May 30 (Reuters) - President Barack Obama pushed back on Saturday at conservative critics of his Supreme Court nominee, Sonia Sotomayor, accusing them of twisting her words to score political points.

"There are, of course, some in Washington who are attempting to draw old battle lines and playing the usual political games, pulling a few comments out of context to paint a distorted picture of Judge Sotomayor's record," Obama said in his weekly radio address.

"But I am confident that these efforts will fail," he said.

Born to Puerto Rican parents who moved to New York during World War Two, Sotomayor would be the first Hispanic to serve on the Supreme Court and the third woman. If confirmed by the Senate, she would join Ruth Bader Ginsburg, the only other woman on the court.

Obama's nomination on Tuesday of the 54-year-old federal appeals court judge to the high court touched off a battle between conservative and liberal interest groups.

The ideological balance of the court -- which decides hot-button social issues such as abortion -- is unlikely to change as a result of the selection of Sotomayor, a liberal. She would replace retiring Justice David Souter, who is also a liberal.

But conservatives have seized on some of Sotomayor's past legal decisions and comments to depict her as a "judicial activist" who would seek to make government policy from the bench rather than strictly interpret the Constitution.

Critics highlighted her 2005 comment that the federal appeals court is "where policy is made" and a 2001 remark that a Latina judge "would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasn't lived that life."